Property access is always an important issue for home owners but for Audrey and Warren Thibault it is critical.
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Mr Thibault is seriously ill with a rare lung cancer. He is confined to a bed and being able get an ambulance to his back door is a major concern.
The last time Mr Thibault required emergency medical help, he was lucky that a couple of police officers were passing his home at the same time paramedics were assessing how to get Mr Thibault out.
The police officers assisted the paramedics to carry Mr Thibault in a stretcher up a back lane.
The problem is that the Thibaults have no front vehicle access to their property and have to enter from the rear lane which is difficult in wet weather.
The narrow lane behind the Thibaults is dirt. On one side their is an issue with stormwater washing away the edge of the road and on the side next to the Thibault’s gate it washes the dirt in.
This causes problems with dirt over the electronic gate runners.
Wet or dry, the conditions restrict an ambulance’s room to move as Ms Thibault explained when her husband returned from hospital recently.
“The road is not wide enough for an ambulance to get in. It had to go back and forward numerous times to get in the drive way.”
The Thibaults spent $35,000 improving the situation on their property when they bought the home after moving from Tamworth almost 16 months ago.
A widened electric gate was installed with extensive driveway works completed up the steep slope to the back door.
The works were done to manage stormwater flow on their property which goes from the high side of the road at the front down to the lane.
Ms Thibault contacted Lithgow Council back in July to fix the road conditions in the back lane after spending a couple of days digging diversion trenches and trying to put dirt on the washed away other side.
Above the Thibaults property further up the back lane there has been road works done and Ms Thibault wants to see them continue.
She received a letter from Council in September saying work on the stormwater infrastructure in the back lane and the drain at the front of the property would be arranged.
Lithgow Council this week said it was disappointed it had not got around to working on the lane but presently were full on with road works after the wet weather earlier this year, especially with the dangerous roads in the Glen Alice area.
“We have made a commitment to fix the problem,” Iain Stewart Operations Group Manager of Lithgow Council said.
Mr Stewart said that Council will be getting on to the lane as soon as they can in the new year.
